News Story: White House plan to gut foreign military financing would cost defense jobs, senators warn

US President Donald Trump

By: Joe Gould

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is mulling plans to kill U.S. subsidies for foreign allies to buy American-made weapons outright and replace them with a loans program.  

The proposal is a bullet point in White House budget director Mick Mulvaney’s controversial plans to slash funding for diplomacy and development, first reported by the Washington Post and confirmed to Defense News by multiple sources. The idea is to replace all FMF grants with loans, save for the security aid committed to Israel— which makes up more than half of the $5.7 billion program. 

While it has uncertain prospects in Congress, it has frustrated key U.S. lawmakers, who say such a move would trash both a critical national security tool and a buttress for the domestic defense industry — just as President Trump says U.S. jobs are his top priority.  

Sen. Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations, earlier this month said deep State Department cuts are “dead on arrival” in Congress. On Thursday, he defended FMF.

“Sometimes we have to subsidize the allies’ purchases, but they buy American equipment and they do pay,” Graham, R-S.C., said of the FMF program. “You have to show me where a loan is better for our national security … This part of the [federal] budget is a percent of a percent. 

A key argument for FMF is that if America ends arms subsidies, it lets strategic allies get weaker and cedes business and influence to Russia and China, its largest rivals strategically and for global defense markets.

“The last thing I want allies to do is go to the Russians and the Chinese because we are penny-wise and pound foolish,” Graham said. 

Read the full story at DefenseNews

News Report: Experts to Senate - Trump Needs to Reassure America’s European, Asian Allies

By: John Grady

The incoming Trump administration needs to go out and reassure publicly and privately our allies that the United States will honor its commitments and do what is necessary to meet new challenges, particularly from Russia and China, three security experts testified Tuesday.

At the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Robert Kagan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said.

There’s a background here not only of campaign rhetoric over burden-sharing, defending the NATO Baltic States, etc., but the Obama’s administration’s not following through on what it said it was going to do if “red lines” were crossed, Kagan said.

But on top of that recent history, the new administration “also has to dig out of a hole of its own making” by what President-elect Donald Trump and campaign officials said publicly before the election.

The hearing was part of a continuing series the committee has held this year looking to reform defense personnel and acquisition policies and how to meet new security challenges.

Gen. Jack Keane, USA, a retired vice chief of staff of the Army, said in dealing with Russia and China the Trump administration must show “strength and resolve.” “We have to be so superior in our capability that our adversaries won’t challenge us.” If the United States doesn’t have the intent to use its military capability to counter aggression, there’s no deterrence.

Editorial: China in the Caucasus

Wiki Info - Image: Wiki Commons

By Emil Sanamyan

For Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, China is an important investor and possible regional stabilizer.

On his first visit to Beijing, then-Armenian defense minister Vazgen Sargsyan is said to have thrown the hosts into a state of mild confusion when he remarked that (paraphrased) “as we say in Armenia, together with the Chinese there is more than a billion of us.” Jokes and linguistic barriers aside, the comment reflected the main motivating factor behind Armenia’s outreach to China. When dealing with larger and often hostile neighbors, it is only natural for small countries to seek out support or, as a paper published by the Armenian government’s think tank put it, a “special partnership,” externally.

The Caucasus, hemmed in by Russia, Turkey, and Iran, is particularly rife with conflicts. Armenia and Azerbaijan are engaged in low-intensity attrition warfare with non-existent bilateral relations. Turkey has largely sided with Azerbaijan and kept its economic ties with Armenia to a minimum. This leaves Armenia reliant on Georgia, itself in conflict with Russia, and Iran, which until recently faced international sanctions. While Azerbaijan is in much less restricted geopolitical position, its relations with Iran, as well as Russia, have also been quite testy.

Read the full story at The Diplomat